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Common Sense Gun Control to Keep Guns out of the Hands of Kids and Criminals

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Common Sense Gun Control to Keep Guns out of the Hands of Kids and Criminals Saint Louis University Public Law Review Volume 18 Number 1 Gun Control (Vol. XVIII, No. 1) Article 3 1999 Taking Guns Seriously: Common Sense Gun Control to Keep Guns Out of the Hands of Kids and Criminals Senator Richard J. Durbin Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.law.slu.edu/plr Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Durbin, Senator Richard J. (1999) "Taking Guns Seriously: Common Sense Gun Control to Keep Guns Out of the Hands of Kids and Criminals," Saint Louis University Public Law Review: Vol. 18 : No. 1 , Article 3. Available at: https://scholarship.law.slu.edu/plr/vol18/iss1/3 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarship Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Saint Louis University Public Law Review by an authorized editor of Scholarship Commons. For more information, please contact Susie Lee. SAINT LOUIS UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW SYMPOSIUM: GUN CONTROL TAKING GUNS SERIOUSLY: COMMON SENSE GUN CONTROL TO KEEP GUNS OUT OF THE HANDS OF KIDS AND CRIMINALS SENATOR RICHARD J. DURBIN* “We have a responsibility to the victims of crime and violence. It is a responsibility to think not only of our own convenience but of the tragedy of sudden death. It is a responsibility to put away childish things - to make the possession and use of firearms a matter undertaken only by serious people who will use them with the restraint and maturity that their dangerous nature deserves - and demands. For too long we have dealt with these deadly weapons as if they were harmless toys. Yet their very presence, the ease of their acquisition, and familiarity of their appearance have led to thousands of deaths each year . It is past time that we wipe this stain of violence from our land.”1 - Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy * Dick Durbin, a Democrat from Springfield, is the 47th U.S. Senator from the State of Illinois and the first Illinois senator to serve on the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee in more than a quarter of a century. He is the state’s senior senator. Elected to the U.S. Senate on November 5, 1996, Durbin filled the seat left vacant by the retirement of his longtime friend and mentor, U.S. Senator Paul Simon. In addition to the Appropriations Committee, Durbin is a member of the Senate Governmental Affairs, Budget and Ethics Committees in the 106th Congress. U.S. Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle (D-SD) also has appointed Durbin to his leadership team, where Durbin serves as Assistant Floor Leader. Durbin, 54 was first elected in 1982 to represent the 20th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives. During his service in the House, Durbin took on the tobacco industry and won passage of landmark legislation to ban smoking on commercial airline flights. He continues to fight taxpayer-paid tobacco subsidies and industry marketing efforts aimed at children. Durbin and his wife Loretta have three children and one grandchild. 1. Dep’t. of Justice, The Clinton Administration’s Law Enforcement Strategy: Fighting Gun Violence and Keeping Guns Away From Criminals and Our Children (May 1999) (visited Oct. 13, 1999) <http://www.usdoj.gov/dag/readingroom/dag_foia1.htm>. 1 SAINT LOUIS UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW 2 SAINT LOUIS UNIVERSITY PUBLIC LAW REVIEW [Vol. 18:1 GUNS IN THE UNITED STATES: There are an estimated 250 million guns in America.2 Nearly seven million American households keep at least one unlocked, loaded gun in the house, including about 1.6 million homes with children.3 Guns kill 34,000 Americans every year - thirteen children every day.4 The rate of gun deaths from homicides and suicides is much higher in the United States than in any other developed country in the world.5 Over 70% of murders in the United States are committed with a firearm.6 The impact of gun violence has been particularly harsh on children. A teenager in the United States today is more likely to die of a gunshot wound than from all other natural causes of death combined.7 In the past few years our nation’s schools have been shattered by gun violence. OCTOBER 1, 1997 - In Pearl, Mississippi, a sixteen year old boy killed his mother then went to his high school and shot nine students, two fatally.8 DECEMBER 1, 1997 - Three students were killed and five were wounded in a hallway at Heath High School by a fourteen year old classmate in West Paducah, Kentucky.9 MARCH 24, 1998 - In Jonesboro, Arkansas, four girls and a teacher were shot to death and ten people were wounded during a false fire alarm at a middle school when two boys eleven and thirteen opened fire from the woods.10 APRIL 24, 1998 - In Edinboro, Pennsylvania, a science teacher was shot to death in front of students at an eighth grade dance by a fourteen year old student.11 MAY 19, 1998 - In Fayetteville, Tennessee, three days before his graduation, an eighteen year old honor student allegedly opened fire in a 2. “A World Full of Guns,” ABC News - 20/20, May 21, 1999. 3. “Poll: A third of U.S. households have guns” Scripps Howard News, June 15, 1999. 4. Department of Justice, “Fighting Gun Violence and Keeping Guns away from Criminals and our Children”, May 1999. 5. Harold H. Reader, Are Guns the Next Tobacco?, 28-SPG Brief 2, (1999). 6. “1998 National Gun Policy Survey of the National Opinion Research Center: Research Findings”, Smith, Tom W., National Opinion Research Center, University of Chicago, May, 1999. 7. Department of Justice, “Fighting Gun Violence and Keeping Guns away from Criminals and our Children”, May, 1999. 8. Tom Wilemon & Brad Branan, Pearl Struggles to Heal, SUN HERALD, Oct. 12, 1997, at A1. 9. Ted Bridis, Praying Students Slain, LEXINGTON HERALD-LEADER, Dec. 2, 1997, at A1. 10. Peter Katel, Five Killed at Arkansas School, USA TODAY, Mar. 25, 1998, at 01A. 11. Jonathan Silver, Stuns Edinboro, PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE, Apr. 26, 1998, at A-1. SAINT LOUIS UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW 1999] TAKING GUNS SERIOUSLY 3 parking lot at a high school killing a classmate who was dating his ex- girlfriend.12 MAY 21, 1998 - Two teenagers in Springfield, Oregon were killed and more than twenty people were hurt when a fifteen year old boy allegedly opened fire at a high school. The boy’s parents were killed at their home.13 APRIL 20, 1999 - In Littleton, Colorado, two teenagers entered their high school with two 12 gauge shotguns, a 9 millimeter semiautomatic rifle and a 9 millimeter semiautomatic pistol and opened fire killing thirteen innocent people.14 These school shootings have challenged lawmakers to find answers to address the problem of gun violence. THE FEDERAL GUN LAWS: The federal gun laws have been enacted in response to national tragedies. Support for the first national gun law, the National Firearms Act of 1934, grew during the 1920’s and the era of Prohibition as a way to stop widespread mobster shootings and turf wars.15 The law imposed a tax of $200 on the transfer of any machine gun or sawed off shot gun.16 The tax was intended to discourage the spread of these firearms and may have served as a disincentive in 1934, but the tax has not been changed in over fifty years. Following the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and presidential candidate Robert Kennedy, Congress passed the Gun Control Act of 1968.17 This law banned the sale of mail-order guns and placed minimum safety standards on imported guns to raise their purchase price.18 No standards were adopted for domestically manufactured guns and to this day, there are more safety restrictions on domestically manufactured toy guns than real guns.19 The Gun Control Act of 1968 imposed restrictions on who could legally receive or possess firearms.20 The Act prohibits the sale of firearms to any person who 12. Tennessee High School Senior Kills Fellow Student, LOS ANGELES TIMES, May 20, 1998, at A16. 13. Shootings, PORTLAND OREGONIAN, May 21, 1999, at A16. 14. Patrick O’Driscoll, The Day Innocence Died: It Began with a Chilling Prophecy, USA TODAY, Apr. 22, 1999, at 04A; Robert Tomsho & Vanessa O’Connell, Gun-Show Sale of Shotguns Becomes Part of Probe of High-School Shooting, WALL ST. J., Apr. 26, 1999, at A11. 15. 26 U.S.C. § 5801-5862 (1935). 16. 26 U.S.C. § 5811(a) (1935). 17. See generally 18 U.S.C. § 922 (1998). 18. Id. § 922(a)(1)(A). 19. Eva H. Shine, Comment, The Junk Predicament: Answers Do Exist, 30 ARIZ. ST. L.J. 1183, 1202 (1998), citing Gunfree, Junk Guns FAQs (visited Feb. 24, 1998) <http://www.gunfree.org/csgv/junkfaq.htm>. 20. See generally 18 U.S.C. § 922. SAINT LOUIS UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW 4 SAINT LOUIS UNIVERSITY PUBLIC LAW REVIEW [Vol. 18:1 is a fugitive from justice; is under indictment for, or has been convicted of, a crime punishable by; imprisonment for more than one year; is an unlawful user of a controlled substance; has been adjudicated as a mental defective or committed to a mental institution; is an alien unlawfully in the United States; was discharged from the armed services under dishonorable conditions; has renounced U.S. citizenship; is subject to a court order restraining him or her from harassing, stalking or; threatening an intimate partner or child or; is a person who has been convicted of domestic violence. 18 U.S.C. 922(g).21 The Brady Handgun Act of 1993, followed the shooting of President Ronald Reagan and his press secretary, Jim Brady in 1981.22 The Brady Act mandated a five-day waiting period and a background check prior to buying a handgun to ensure that the purchaser was not a prohibited purchaser under the Gun Control Act of 1968.23 In November of 1998, the five-day waiting period expired.24 Although the mandatory five-day cooling off period has expired, background checks have remained in place.25 Between March 1, 1994, and November 29, 1998, 312,000 felons, fugitives and other prohibited purchasers were denied a sale of a handgun.26 On November 30, 1998, the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (“NICS”) was implemented.27 In its first year of operation, the NICS kept over 89,000 felons, fugitives, stalkers and other criminals from purchasing new firearms—an average of 246 illegal gun sales blooked every day.28 According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, NICS has prevented an estimated 49,000 felons and other 21.
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